How Cities Use Regulation for Innovation: The Case of Uber, Lyft and Sidecar in San Francisco

How do government actors facilitate or hinder private innovation in urban mobility, and how does local context mediate this relationship? In this paper the authors examine the regulatory response to on-demand ride services—or “ridesourcing”—through a case study of San Francisco, CA. The entry of Lyft, Sidecar, and UberX in San Francisco in 2012 raised serious questions about the legality of ridesourcing, and sparked significant conflict within regulatory agencies. After sustained debate, regulators decided to welcome the services provided by new companies and crafted a new regulatory framework that legalized the provision of for-profit, on-demand ride services using personal vehicles. The authors ask, given strong arguments on each side, what motivated public officials in each city to facilitate, rather than hinder, the new services? How did they achieve regulatory reform?

• Record URL:
  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trpro.2017.05.232
• Record URL:
  http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352146517305379
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/issn/23521465
• Supplemental Notes:
  • © 2017 Onesimo Flores and Lisa Rayle. Published by Elsevier B.V.
• Authors:
  • Flores, Onesimo
  • Rayle, Lisa
• Conference:
  • World Conference on Transport Research - WCTR 2016
  • Location: Shanghai , China
  • Date: 2016-7-10 to 2016-7-15
• Publication Date: 2017

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: References;
• Pagination: pp 3760-3772
• Serial:
  • Transportation Research Procedia
  • Volume: 25
  • Issue Number: 0
  • Publisher: Elsevier
  • ISSN: 2352-1465
  • Serial URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/23521465/
• Publication flags:

  Open Access (libre)

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Demand responsive transportation; Innovation; Mobility; Policy making; Public transit; Regulations; Sustainable transportation
• Identifier Terms: Lyft; Uber
• Geographic Terms: San Francisco (California)
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Planning and Forecasting; Policy; Public Transportation; Vehicles and Equipment;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01639783
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jun 28 2017 2:40PM